John Crawford Walmart shooting: Ohio officer back on the job?

One of two police officers who shot a black man, John Crawford, at a Walmart in Ohio, has returned to active duty. In Los Angeles and New York, communities are protesting recent cases of black men killed by police.

ByStaff, Associated PressAugust 21, 2014

On Aug. 5, 2014, members of the Ohio Student Association gathered outside the Ohio Attorney General's office in Columbus, Ohio, to call for the release of in-store video in the fatal police shooting of a man at a Dayton-area Wal-Mart. .

Beavercreek, Ohio — A city official says one of two police officers involved in the fatal shooting of a man at an Ohio Wal-Mart is back on the job.

Beavercreek city attorney Stephen McHugh tells the Dayton Daily Newsthat Sgt. David Darkow has returned to work following the shooting earlier this month in suburban Dayton. He says the other officer remains on administrative leave.

Neither McHugh nor the Ohio attorney general has said which officer fired the shot that killed 21-year-old John Crawford in the Beavercreek store Aug. 5. Police say Crawford twice ignored commands to put down an air rifle he was holding.

The Crawford case is one of several high profile shootings of black men by police that have generated community protests.As The Christian Science Monitor reported, many are worried that the racial unrest in Ferguson, Mo., could erupt on the streets of New York this weekend, with a major protest march and rally scheduled to take place in Staten Island at the site of the sidewalk killing of Eric Garner allegedly at the hands of police.

The march, already planned by the Rev. Al Sharpton two weeks before the police shooting of unarmed teen Mike Brown in Ferguson, could draw more than 15,000 protesters to New York’s outer borough, drawing demonstrators both from the tri-state area and from across the United States.

And in Los Angeles another case is a source of tension between police and residents, reports the Monitor.

In Los Angeles, 25-year-old Ezell Ford was shot and killed by police on Aug. 11, just two days after Brown’s death. According to news reports, the unarmed man was mentally ill. Police say that after they approached him he tackled one of two officers and was trying to get the officer's gun, but witnesses dispute that version of events and say there was no struggle between Ford and the officers and that Ford was surrendering. On Sunday, protesters gathered outside the Los Angeles Police Department headquarters to demand more information, and an attorney that Ford’s family has hired has promised a wrongful-death suit.